Nader sues Democratic Party for conspiring against democracy

October 31, 2007 2:07 PM

Yesterday, Ralph Nader sued the Democratic Party for conspiring to prevent him from running for president in 2004. The lawsuit alleges that defendants used “groundless and abusive litigation” to bankrupt Ralph Nader’s campaign and force him off the ballot in 18 states, and names as co-defendants the Kerry-Edwards campaign, the Service Employees International Union, private law firms, and organizations like the Ballot Project and America Coming Together that were created to promote voter turnout on behalf of the Democratic ticket. According to attorney Carl Mayer from the team that filed the suit, interviewed this morning by Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman, "what this lawsuit will do, and the importance of it is, is to set a precedent so that the two-party monopoly system that shuts out minor parties in a way that other Western democracies never do, that this will set a precedent to prevent this type of intimidation and harassment."
posted by finite (236 comments total)

Can we counter-sue for Nader taking votes away from Gore?
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 2:12 PM on October 31, 2007

No.
posted by finite at 2:12 PM on October 31, 2007

So... any merit?
posted by Artw at 2:13 PM on October 31, 2007

No.

eponysterical
posted by kuujjuarapik at 2:14 PM on October 31, 2007

Can we counter-sue for Nader taking votes away from Gore?

Only if we can sue Gore for taking votes from Nader. And for the record, Buchanan took more electoral votes away from Bush than Nader did from Gore. And who knows how many people turned away from Lieberman. Let's sue him for being batshit insane. What the Dems did to Nader in 2004 was an embarassment although I doubt this lawsuit is going to have much of an impact on the party system.
posted by allen.spaulding at 2:14 PM on October 31, 2007

Carl Mayer is the same guy that sued Belichick and the Patriots a few months ago.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 2:14 PM on October 31, 2007

Merits aside...Nader can go Fuck himself.

No difference between Bush and Gore my ass



I'll go rant somewhere else now thank you...
posted by slapshot57 at 2:17 PM on October 31, 2007 [8 favorites]

Nader needs to sue himself for character assassination.
posted by billypilgrim at 2:19 PM on October 31, 2007 [2 favorites]

I have never agreed more with slapshot57.
posted by found missing at 2:19 PM on October 31, 2007

Gore wasn't running in 2004.
posted by finite at 2:20 PM on October 31, 2007

He's just bitter that he didn't come close to matching Ross Perot. Or George Wallace. Or even John Anderson!
posted by loquax at 2:22 PM on October 31, 2007

Gore wasn't running in 2004.

Yeah, and you know why? Because he wasn't the incumbent president as he was supposed to be. Thank you, Nader.
posted by found missing at 2:23 PM on October 31, 2007

It's mind blowing just how corrupt elections in the US are.
posted by chunking express at 2:23 PM on October 31, 2007

What's good for the cheating Republican goose is good for the cheating Democratic gander.

It's still a bit silly, though.
posted by Reggie Digest at 2:24 PM on October 31, 2007

""what this lawsuit will do, and the importance of it is, is to set a precedent so that the two-party monopoly system that shuts out minor parties in a way that other Western democracies never do, that this will set a precedent to prevent this type of intimidation and harassment." "


YEEEAAAAARRRGH!

A WINNER-TAKE-ALL ELECTORAL SYSTEM PREDICTS A TWO PARTY ESTABLISHMENT! THIS IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN OUR SYSTEM AND MOST OTHER WESTERN DEMOCRACIES. YOUR LAWSUIT CANNOT CHANGE THIS! DIE! DIE! DIE!
posted by klangklangston at 2:25 PM on October 31, 2007 [8 favorites]

Yeah, and you know why? Because he wasn't the incumbent president as he was supposed to be. Thank you, Nader.

Thank you, lockbox.
posted by Reggie Digest at 2:25 PM on October 31, 2007

Ralph Nader once again doing all he can to help the Republicans.

I wish that he were here right now so that I could spit on him.

Furthermore, I wish that everyone who has died as a result of the Iraq war were still alive so that they could spit on him, too.
posted by Afroblanco at 2:25 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

And people bitter that Gore lost because of Nadar need to get over themselves. If Gore couldn't beat Bush on his own merits then that's not Nadar's problem. The electoral system in the US is fucked up. People need to call it out.
posted by chunking express at 2:25 PM on October 31, 2007 [4 favorites]

Poor Ralph Nader. He's basically correct in what he says, but he is so stubborn and egotistical that he is increasingly difficult to take seriously. He keeps confusing "we the people" with "me the people."
posted by googly at 2:27 PM on October 31, 2007 [7 favorites]

After what he did to the 2000 elections, I'd hardly complain if somebody stapled Nader's ass to the upholstery of a '63 Corvair and took him for a long drive in the country.

As much a "threat to democracy" as the two-party monopoly might be, the slack-jawed fascist he helped put in the Oval Office is infinitely worse. I hope this lawsuit bankrupts him and every last goddamned *PIRG.
posted by felix betachat at 2:27 PM on October 31, 2007

It might be worth noting in passing that Ralphy, a staunch supporter of rights and legalities, does not allow unions in his own organization and give no benefits to those he employs.

Ralph has the appealing message that corporations are destructive of this and that and yet he offers no plan for what he would do to make things better. In fact, it is lobby and interest groups that cripple legislation, and this sort of thing remains legal. Would he rid our system of this? If so, when and where has he proposed this idea?
posted by Postroad at 2:29 PM on October 31, 2007 [4 favorites]

Nader can suck a bag of dicks.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 2:29 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

Insert obligatory joke about American democracy reaching its "nader" in 2000 ======> here.
posted by googly at 2:30 PM on October 31, 2007

YEEEAAAAARRRGH!

Dean?
posted by dismas at 2:31 PM on October 31, 2007

yeah there is a difference between Gore/Kerry and Bush, but I think it is more a difference of personality rather than a difference of party. I do think there are differences between the GOP and the Dems, but not huge ones. I will be shocked, shocked I say, if when the democrats win the presidential election (this time or down the road) they overturn the majority of things Bush has set up. Clinton herself has already taken a page out of the Bush camps media control playbook by several restricting unscripted media access. Both parties like to use "free speech zones", Obama has been making some good noise about Net neutrality etc but (as of right now) the most he's getting is a VP slot and that's not a guarantee.
Nader is a nuisance for a lot of people, and people hate that so they get all angry and stuff at him, but I tell you he is more trustworthy then 98% of the political field out there and his message about 2 party domination is true.
posted by edgeways at 2:33 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

FWIW, I am not a Nader supporter, but I believe that 3rd (and 4th, 5th, 6th, etc) political parties are very important and that something is very wrong when people expect them to just go away. If you disagree, and think 3rd parties should get out of the way of the big dogs, please at least RTFA before posting about why. Thanks.

On preview, wow, I had no idea there would be this much hate! Please, Gore fans, also read this comment I just favorited about our pal Al. He conceded early! Where is the outrage about that?

And again, this lawsuit is about the 2004 election!
posted by finite at 2:35 PM on October 31, 2007

Congress has enough evidence for an impeachment inquiry.
posted by homunculus at 2:36 PM on October 31, 2007

The lawsuit is about the 2004 election, the hate is residual.
posted by found missing at 2:36 PM on October 31, 2007

The electoral system in the US is fucked up. People need to call it out.

Generally, electoral reform doesn't involve being complicit in handing over the reins of power to maniacs.
posted by Pants! at 2:39 PM on October 31, 2007

So pants!, no liberal candidate should have run in the 2000 election? That's kind of stupid.
posted by chunking express at 2:42 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

And yeah, I think Nadar is a bit of a dick, but dick or not, you should be allowed to run for president.
posted by chunking express at 2:42 PM on October 31, 2007

Pants! said Generally, electoral reform doesn't involve being complicit in handing over the reins of power to maniacs.

You're talking about Gore's complicity now, right? 'Cause, you read the comment I linked to above?
posted by finite at 2:44 PM on October 31, 2007

Don't blame me. I voted for Kodos!

The two party system must die. And if this lawsuit somehow puts another nail in the coffin of the fact that in the US we get one more choice than a totalitarian state then good on Nader.
posted by quadog at 2:52 PM on October 31, 2007

What did Ralph Nader do to elicit so much hate? Other than run for president, something which is entirely within his rights to do. Democrats should have a compelling enough platform such that they don't have to worry about challenges from the left.
posted by c*r at 2:54 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

Christ what an asshole.
posted by jonson at 2:56 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

I don't blame Nader for the 2000 election; I blame the SCOTUS.
posted by Brocktoon at 2:56 PM on October 31, 2007 [4 favorites]

My vote for Nader would never have went to Gore, so the premise is faulty. Indeed, that arrogant sense of entitlement (it's Gore's rightful vote) is anathema to the Democratic party.

Oh, and do I have your permission to vote for someone other than Hillary? Or is she "entitled" as well?
posted by RavinDave at 2:58 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

I believe that 3rd (and 4th, 5th, 6th, etc) political parties are very important

I wish I could. Given the spoils system, entrenched fundraising machinery and everything on up, any political party outside the main two is hopelessly irrelevant.
posted by psmealey at 2:59 PM on October 31, 2007

Wow, that comment really shows that someone on the internet is upset with Al Gore. I concede, I was wrong to ever doubt you. Sorry about that.

All kidding aside, of course the two party system sure does suck. However, it's what we have. Trying to run from the right or left to prove a point only undermines the actual ability of people, who may agree with half of what you think is important, to win the electoral college and actually be in power for four years.
posted by Pants! at 3:01 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

If this works we'll eat like kings!
posted by mecran01 at 3:04 PM on October 31, 2007

Man, are people still trotting out "It's okay to throw away your vote on some no-hoper because Democrats and Republicans are exactly the same"?

Have these people not watched the news in the last years or something?
posted by Artw at 3:04 PM on October 31, 2007

Can we counter-sue for Nader taking votes away from Gore?

Yeah! Everyone knows those votes were the personal property of the Democratic party, Not only is it your requirement to vote for the Democrats or Republicans, if you don't, you're a thief. Stealing their god given right to your vote.
posted by delmoi at 3:04 PM on October 31, 2007 [9 favorites]

Fuck him.

I blame Nader directly for Bush winning both elections. The margin was narrow enough that the votes he stole cost the Democrats the election. If he didn't run in 2000, the margin would have been enough that there wouldn't have been a need for a recount.
posted by mike3k at 3:07 PM on October 31, 2007

“What did Ralph Nader do to elicit so much hate? Other than run for president...”

He didn't just run for President, his message was that there was no difference between Gore and Bush and that, consequently, anyone who worried that voting for him would take away votes for Gore were irrational, because insofar as that was true, it didn't matter if Bush or Gore won.

To put it differently, if it were just a matter of voting one's conscience, then whether or not Bush and Gore were similar was pretty much irrelevant. Nader was very different from both of them—it didn't matter if they were like each other. So he didn't need to make that explicit argument, he could have just said that they were both far to his right.

But arguing that there was no difference between them was an argument implicitly aimed at those potential Nader supporters who worried about strategic voting concerns—those that recognized Nader's chances of winning were very small and thus their vote for him would affect the outcome of the race between Bush and Gore. The message was saying, "don't worry about that, it doesn't matter which of them wins if I don't".

And, obviously (or at least it's obvious to most of us), it did matter quite a bit because there's a huge difference between Bush and Gore.

Basically, claiming that there was no difference between Bush and Gore is a lie of such magnitude, both in its denial of reality and in its consequences, that it matches the damage and egregiousness of anything Bush has said.

That's why some of us hate him. He's a demagogue who put his own ego ahead of what was best for the US and lied about it in the process. So, fuck him.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 3:08 PM on October 31, 2007 [26 favorites]

I blame idiot Americans who voted for Bush for his winning. And then they did it again. Awesome!

I love American "democracy": You can vote for this dude, or that dude, but no one else or it all falls apart.
posted by chunking express at 3:10 PM on October 31, 2007 [10 favorites]

or, mike3k, Gore could have won his own state...that may have put him over the top. But, yes, lets talk about those stolen votes Nader took away, the bastard.
posted by rockhopper at 3:11 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

It killed me when Bush won in 2000. And untold numbers of others in the literal sense.
And when he was reelected in 04 I was dumbfounded. But blaming R N is flat out wrong. Yeah. I wish he had never run. But he had a right to present his views.
It was the electorate who chose Bush not once but twice. How about directing the vitriol towards the electorate and the flawed two party system.
It will all happen again if the problems (caged electronic voting machines? Party controlled local election boards? Gerrymandered districts? Just to name a few.) are not seriously addressed.
posted by notreally at 3:12 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

Whatever residue of sympathy I had for Nader is gone.
posted by aerotive at 3:13 PM on October 31, 2007

Dear Ralph,

STFU.

Sincerely,

Everyone (but you, apparently)
posted by tommasz at 3:17 PM on October 31, 2007

My vote for Nader would never have went to Gore, so the premise is faulty. Indeed, that arrogant sense of entitlement (it's Gore's rightful vote) is anathema to the Democratic party.

Oh, and do I have your permission to vote for someone other than Hillary? Or is she "entitled" as well?

Nobody here is saying you didn't have the right to vote for Nader. Just that, by doing so, you own a little piece of the Iraq war, not to mention all the other bullshit that's gone down.

That sense of moral rectitude in the face of all evidence to the contrary (not to mention your inability to conjugate the verb "to go" properly) is characteristic for your tribe. Damn everything else, at least I was right. Face it...you weren't. Lots of people are dead because you and your shaggy-pitted ilk decided to cast your protest votes. That was your democratic right (pray that it always be so), just as it's mine to say that you're an irresponsible person who has abetted the cause of tyranny.
posted by felix betachat at 3:19 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

hmm, he left out Hank Aaron's Bat
posted by arialblack at 3:20 PM on October 31, 2007

For fuck's sake people. I'm scarred that there are people here who wanted Joe Lieberman to have that much power and that they have the gall to blame others for Iraq. Gore/Lieberman was not a peace ticket by any means and for all you know, we could be in Iran by now.

More importantly, Nader and his supporters have nothing to do with why Bush is in power. Blame the millions of Americans who voted for Bush and blame the millions of Gore voters who couldn't get their friends and family to show up.
posted by allen.spaulding at 3:24 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

On preview, wow, I had no idea there would be this much hate! Please, Gore fans, also read this comment I just favorited about our pal Al. He conceded early! Where is the outrage about that?

Well, he later revoked his concession, it hardly makes a difference, if he had won the recount, he still would have been elected. What happened here is that Kathrine Harris and Jeb Bush conspired to steal the election through various Shannanagans. Ought to blame them, not gore.
posted by delmoi at 3:25 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

EB makes a fine observation.

I don't hate Nader, nor do I blame him alone for Bush winning in 2000. But I was repulsed by his naive, petty, egocentric, and incredibly cynical statements that Bush and Gore were essentially the same, and that it really didn't matter which one of them one voted for.

Naive, because of course it mattered who one voted for - just look at the composition of the SCOTUS.

Egocentric, because he essentially declared that he, and he alone, could save the country from what ailed it.

Cynical, because it played right into the fear that many voters on the left had that participatory democracy is run by The Man, and that the best thing to do is opt out and take the highly symbolic but strategically inept action: voting for someone with no legislative experience, no solid ideas for how to govern, and no chance at all to win.
posted by googly at 3:26 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

I once worked with someone who'd been a laywer for Nader during his early post-corvair days. It's difficult to put into words just how much disgust my cow-orker had for Nader, before he even tried to run. I can only imagine the anger-levels now.
posted by nomisxid at 3:28 PM on October 31, 2007

I believe Nader was able to see some difference between Republicans and Democrats, namely, the relative velocities that their knees hit the floor when it came to corporate influence in Washington (or some quote to that effect).

Perhaps this argument was disingenuous, but to say that he had no right to make it - I'm not sure I can agree. At any rate, it's for the voters to decide who is president, not the candidates.
posted by c*r at 3:28 PM on October 31, 2007

Oh come on. There's is so much to blame for Bush winning in 2000, why stop at Nader? There's hanging chads. There's Diebold machines. There's an electoral coup by the supreme court. There's names struck from voting lists. And, more than anything, there is an American public who was willing to vote for an unqualified simpleton because they would rather have a beer with him than that big boring lockbox guy.

Next to them and their ability to wreak havoc on an election, Nader is just a mouse speaking out angry platitudes during an avalanche of corruption, incompetence, and bullshit.
posted by Astro Zombie at 3:29 PM on October 31, 2007 [5 favorites]

Lots of people are dead because you and your shaggy-pitted ilk decided to cast your protest votes. That was your democratic right (pray that it always be so), just as it's mine to say that you're an irresponsible person who has abetted the cause of tyranny.

Word. Yes, you have the right to vote for anyone you want; and for that matter, I think anyone should have the right to run. What I don't think you should have the right to do is absolve yourself of responsibility for the direct consequences of your action at the polls. Why do we have Bush? In no small part, because of Nader. If you voted for Nader, we have Bush in no small part because of you. Deal or don't, that's how it is.

And yeah. Fuck Ralph Nader. And why is this happening now -- three years after the fact? The '08 donations not exactly pouring in, perhaps?
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:29 PM on October 31, 2007

Wow, there's some interesting vitrol here. So if I say Gore wasn't left enough and I vote for Nader, that means I support Bush and the war? Wow, talk about doublespeak.
posted by blue_beetle at 3:32 PM on October 31, 2007 [4 favorites]

I'm so embarrassed for Democratic Party supporters that they rail against Ralph Nader. The man is a hero. The reason that people you know survived the car accidents they have been in is Ralph Nader. The reason I came out of two accidents unscathed is the work of Ralph Nader.

I can't say anything even close about anyone else in the political arena.
posted by srboisvert at 3:37 PM on October 31, 2007

Yeah - it's great that he helped with automobile safety. That doesn't mean he's innocent of what has happened over the last seven years.
posted by Pants! at 3:39 PM on October 31, 2007

Just that, by doing so, you own a little piece of the Iraq war, not to mention all the other bullshit that's gone down.

So if you voted for a Democrat who supported the Iraq war, how big a piece of it do you own then? A bigger piece or a smaller piece than if you voted for Nader?
posted by PeterMcDermott at 3:42 PM on October 31, 2007 [8 favorites]

No, I think the deal is that people who weren't being entirely disingenuous or disinterested in the results could easily have predicted that in such a close race, any vote cast not for Gore was essentially the moral equivalent of one less vote Bush needed to win. Protest votes are great, but I agree with KFB that everyone ought to take some responsibility for the consequences of the votes they cast. Everybody could easily predict that Nader was not going to win.

I could vote for, say, a peaceful pink unicorn (the ontological vote) and feel good about myself, but might in a larger sense be obligated that I was throwing my vote away.
posted by newdaddy at 3:42 PM on October 31, 2007

It was the electorate who chose Bush not once but twice.

Quoted for truth.

Yes, obviously there was Diebold and SCOTUS etc. But seriously.. more people voted for Bush.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 3:44 PM on October 31, 2007

be obligated to admit that I was throwing my vote away, is what I meant.
posted by newdaddy at 3:44 PM on October 31, 2007

NO. More people did not vote for Bush. That's common knowledge, and not even disputed. Gore was the winner of the popular vote.
posted by newdaddy at 3:45 PM on October 31, 2007

HEY EVERYONE, THE POST IS ABOUT THE 2004 ELECTION AND HAS NOTHING AT ALL TO DO WITH AL GORE.

What most people in this thread seem to be harping on is the notion that the so-called Democratic Party had a right to whatever votes Ralph Nader would have won. Well, that mentality is probably why the Democrats (allegedly) forced Nader out of the race.

Even (allegedly) cheating, Kerry lost, and still would have lost even without Nader "taking away" his votes. Deal with it. Maybe send Ross Perot a gift basket while you're at it.
posted by Reggie Digest at 3:46 PM on October 31, 2007 [2 favorites]

Quoted for untruth?
posted by found missing at 3:46 PM on October 31, 2007

Ralph Nader: Unsane At Any Speed.
posted by rdone at 3:48 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

If you voted for Nader you might as well have written your vote on a napkin and flushed it down the toilet.

I am all for something other than a two-party system but seriously, the Green isn't good for anything other than a laugh. This lawsuit is just as silly.
posted by GavinR at 3:49 PM on October 31, 2007

NO. More people did not vote for Bush. That's common knowledge, and not even disputed. Gore was the winner of the popular vote.

In 2000, sure. But you'll probably notice that in 2004, Bush got rather more votes than Gore did, and quite a few more votes than Kerry did. And seeing as we're talking about 2004...
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 3:53 PM on October 31, 2007

Everyone who thinks we're talking about 2004 just because crazy Ralph is suing about 2004 is entirely missing the point.
posted by found missing at 3:54 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

After what he did to the 2000 elections

Which was what, exactly? Run?

You people who complain about Nader seeking the presidency are part of what's wrong with America.

As large a part as Bush? No. But you're part of it nonetheless.
posted by Flunkie at 3:54 PM on October 31, 2007 [2 favorites]

What most people in this thread seem to be harping on is the notion that the so-called Democratic Party had a right to whatever votes Ralph Nader would have won.

No. What we're harping on is something obvious to damn near everyone -- it's certainly obvious enough to the GOP -- and that's that Bush wasn't the second choice of any Nader voter. Had these people not voted for Nader, it seems more likely than not they would have

A. Voted for some random no-chance-in-hell candidate, maybe as a write-in (Jello Biafra, Zombie Abraham Lincoln, Batman); or

B. Stayed home; or

C. Voted democratic.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:56 PM on October 31, 2007

Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution:

The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate

The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;

The person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as the President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President.

The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.

posted by scalefree at 3:57 PM on October 31, 2007

No one put it better than EB. The thread should have stopped there.
posted by found missing at 3:58 PM on October 31, 2007

"The reason that people you know survived the car accidents they have been in is Ralph Nader. The reason I came out of two accidents unscathed is the work of Ralph Nader."

Bullshit. Nader's influence on auto manufacturers has been overstated, just like he overstated his case regarding the Corvair.
posted by klangklangston at 3:59 PM on October 31, 2007

felix betachat The fact that you're a proscriptivist grammar wanker is all that is needed to expose you as a hysterical fool. I don't "own" a piece of the Iraqi invasion any more than the DNC, who wouldn't provide a better candidate in the first place. Next time concentrate more on "rhetoric". Nice tactic to bray: "Nobody here is saying you didn't have the right to vote for Nader" and then go on to negate that by telling me exactly why I didn't have that right. Maybe you should run for office. You have that Hillary double-speak down nicely.
posted by RavinDave at 3:59 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

Doug Saunders, discussing the divide between instrumental and expressive voters:

Dennis Kavanagh, a professor of politics at the University of Liverpool, noticed recently that expressive voting is becoming more popular in his country. "Social class, left-right ideology and party loyalty are declining as cues for deciding how to vote," he wrote. Instead, voters are asking themselves, "How do I feel about myself voting for this party?"

Expressive voting, he observes, is "a form of self-characterization." The results of your vote are less important than the sort of person you become by voting. For those Ralph Nader voters, the important thing is to be the sort of people who vote for Ralph Nader.

Reggie Digest: HEY EVERYONE, THE POST IS ABOUT THE 2004 ELECTION AND HAS NOTHING AT ALL TO DO WITH AL GORE.

The biggest impact Ralph Nader has had on American politics was tipping the vote in Florida in 2000. Somehow Nader himself hasn't realized this.

edgeways: yeah there is a difference between Gore/Kerry and Bush, but I think it is more a difference of personality rather than a difference of party. I do think there are differences between the GOP and the Dems, but not huge ones.

You've got to be kidding.

Norman Podhoretz is foreign policy adviser to Giulani. Romney can't tell the difference between Iran and al-Qaeda. Go read the Corner on waterboarding, or Coulter, or listen to Limbaugh.

Or read this GOP report on the Republican base:

The Republican effort to make the Bush tax cuts permanent generates strongly held feelings from the Base, more so than for any other domestic initiative tested in the survey. Proposals to erase the Bush tax cuts generate considerable anger from the Base. The two issues together cover 69% of the Base with extremely strong feelings about at least one of them. ...

Framing Democrat health care proposals as “placing a government bureaucrat between patients and doctors” or as “creating big government-run health care” can be very effective in mobilizing the Republican Base, especially in tandem with the motivating messages on health care reform. Two-thirds of the Base has extremely strong feelings about one or both of these ways of describing the Democrat approach to health care. ...

Democrat Position on Medicare Prescription Drug Program. The Republican Base separates this issue from the other health care issues and singles it out with a significant level of disapproval. This is especially the case for seniors in our Base. A 55% majority of our seniors have extremely strong feelings about “Democrats who want to take the Medicare prescription drug benefit away from seniors.” Seventy-two percent (72%) of the Republican seniors express varying degrees of anger with this Democrat position.

As a (Canadian) centrist, I think the Republican base is -- how do I put this? -- completely detached from reality. The sooner they're separated from power, the better.
posted by russilwvong at 4:00 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

In 2000, I lived in Palm Beach County but I didn't vote because I turned 18 only a few days later. I would have voted for Nader, but we all know that my vote would not have made a difference in the outcome, so why this bullshit outrage? I believed (and still believe) that the US democratic model is supremely fucked.

If Ralph Nader never existed, Al Gore still wouldn't have been elected president. That election was stolen flat out and everyone can hem and haw over details but that's a fact. And Gore was complicit in that. If Nader had been in Gore's place, he would have fought the shit out of that decision! The battle would still be going on. Because Nader's a scrappy bastard, and Al Gore just wasn't strong enough. If he wasn't strong enough to fight the results of the election, how the fuck would he have dealt with 203anything else that happened in the next four years?

In 2004, after the nightmare of the first years of Bush, I caved and voted for Kerry. As much as I did not like the dude, and as much as I used to say that I would never vote for the Dems, Nader was not available as an option. Well, guess what? Kerry didn't manage to win that one, either. And no hue and cry was raised, there were murmurings about Ohio and voter fraud but NO ONE DID ANYTHING ABOUT IT. We are all complicit in that.

I now live in Canada and I plan to order my absentee ballot and promptly NOT use it. Maybe I'll sell it on eBay, or torch it. But I have no desire to vote another dynasty into power because there are "no other choices." We have more than two political parties in Canada and it seems to work out just fine. So why are Americans denied what every other functioning democracy has?

So the Dems and the Republicans can go fuck themselves if they want to shove two options down your throat. If you can only get Coke or Pepsi, what happens to the people who just want a sip of water?

2008 - Hillary Clinton
2012 - Hillary Clinton
2016 - Jeb Bush
2020 - Jeb Bush
2024 - Chelsea Clinton
2028 - Prescott Bush
2032 - One of the Gore kids
2036 - Jenna Bush (with her sister as VP)
...
posted by SassHat at 4:01 PM on October 31, 2007 [5 favorites]

Screw the "I blame Nader" bullshit. I voted for Gore in 2000 because the obnoxious-as-hell anti-abortion people who had been walking around my college campus with small children wearing "I'm a life, not a choice" shirts were standing near the polling place. I thought to myself, "Oh yeah, Supreme Court" and voted for Gore.

You know why I was about to vote for Nader until that point? Lieberman. Have people forgotten that guy, the one who pretty much blew his way out of the democrat party only a few years after being the friggin VP candidate? There were a lot of reasons that 2000 ended up how it did. Don't blame any one factor.
posted by mikeh at 4:04 PM on October 31, 2007

SassHat: I now live in Canada and I plan to order my absentee ballot and promptly NOT use it.

Send it to me and I'll fill it out for you.
posted by russilwvong at 4:06 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

I've only recently realized the true difference between Democrats and Republicans: the Republicans loudly stand against my ideals, the Democrats voice support, but ultimately betray my ideals.

Third parties are just a suicide pill for the two-party system.
posted by malocchio at 4:06 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

So, I take it the consensus here is that, even if the Democratic Party really did all the stuff alleged in Nader's lawsuit, that's ok, because Bush is bad?
posted by The World Famous at 4:13 PM on October 31, 2007 [2 favorites]

No one is seriously saying the man had no right to express his opinions or run for office. Don't take jokes like "can we sue him for stealing Gore's votes" as a legal mandate, fer crying out loud. But there are a lot of things we have the right to do which are still ill-advised, counterproductive, and make us look like assholes.

There are four assumed tenets here (and if you disagree with any of them, you're not part of this discussion's demographic anyway):
1. If Gore had won in 2000, we'd be in a better America today.
2. Nader's "share" of the liberal vote would've resulted in a Gore victory had Nader not run.
3. If Kerry had won in 2004, we'd be in a better America today.
4. A significant Nader candidacy in 2004 would have put the Kerry candidacy at further risk in a close election.

Now in hindsight, Kerry lost despite Nader's absence from most ballots. But it was close, and these alleged abuses were committed by folks who thought Kerry really had a shot. Since Nader was more concerned about his own ideology than the practical future of America, they (allegedly) took it upon themselves to oppose him by any means necessary.

I'm not defending it. Though the democrats may be preferable to the republicans, no one should be manipulating the system to get into power. However, I'm willing to believe that this example was people trying, in good faith, to free the U.S. from the grips of idiocy, corruption, and superstition. And while I can't support it, I personally have a hard time condemning it as well.
posted by Riki tiki at 4:19 PM on October 31, 2007

I personally do not have a hard time condemning political operatives in any party who think that their goals are so righteous that they are justified in using "any means necessary" to achieve them.
posted by The World Famous at 4:24 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

Is it "OK"? If we're not going to punish the Bush administration for its massive abuses of the Constitution then we should definitely let the Dems slide on this. Both or neither, that's my vote.
posted by scalefree at 4:26 PM on October 31, 2007

It's difficult for me to read this post and not marvel at the irony of the fact that al-Qaeda means, quite literally, Base.

Double-speak, indeed.
posted by fingers_of_fire at 4:31 PM on October 31, 2007

Seriously? One political party should be immune from civil suit if members of the opposing party are not punished for completely unrelated wrongs?

Should that be pleaded as an affirmative defense?
posted by The World Famous at 4:31 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

“The fact that you're a proscriptivist grammar wanker is all that is needed to expose you as a hysterical fool.”

It's prescriptivist, you, um, fool wanker sort of person, you.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 4:39 PM on October 31, 2007 [2 favorites]

It killed me when Bush won in 2000.

I die a little death when people say Bush won in 2000. Fuck that, that maggot didn't win shit. His daddy pressed some SCOTUS flesh and called in favors.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 4:47 PM on October 31, 2007

I have very different memories of 2000 Al Gore than many in this thread, apparently--he was a very different kind of person then (check his pre-2000 record), and pick Joe Lieberman as his running mate, for crying out loud. Also, while I thought Bush was a lying douche in 2000, I--and, I would venture to guess, many others--had no idea he would turn out to be the absolute nightmare he is. (How many of you had even heard of neocons or PNAC in 2000? How many thought he wanted to invade Iraq, even though it was the first agenda item in his first cabinet meeting in Feb. 2001?)

Al Gore was a lame candidate in 2000, and that's why he lost the election. Since then, he's become the kind of leader people want to support, but to my recollection, he wasn't at all that, then.

Per the lawsuit, I'll have to read more about it, but Nader may have a point--if third parties are actively being shut out of the process, we have no hope of fundamental reforms of any kind in the near future. My personal like or dislike of Nader won't cloud my clarity on that: the two-party system is broken.
posted by LooseFilter at 4:53 PM on October 31, 2007 [4 favorites]

I did and do defend Nader's right to run, and anyone else's right to vote for him.

That does not mean he isn't an ass. I used to look up to this guy, and now, I wonder if he was always cuckoo, or just lost it at some point between Unsafe at Any Speed and 2000 or so.

The Electoral College needs to go. Nader isn't the guy to do it, because his own ego gets in the way of actually encouraging meaningful reform. His complete inability to understand what was at stake in the last two elections, especially 2004, and what's at stake now makes him an unwitting tool of the right, who all despise him, and thus made enemies of the left as well. It's very painful to watch. And hard not to hate him for the elections, though honestly, Gore blew it, Florida was tampered with, and the SCOTUS lost its soul, none of which he is responsible for.
posted by emjaybee at 4:54 PM on October 31, 2007

That fucking egotistical asshole.
posted by Ironmouth at 5:00 PM on October 31, 2007

And for the record, Buchanan took more electoral votes away from Bush than Nader did from Gore.

Statements like that have got to be backed up. Otherwise they are just noise. "I heard it somewhere" won't count either.
posted by Ironmouth at 5:02 PM on October 31, 2007

So what would be the legal theory here, intentional tort? Wouldn't we be past Statute of Limitations?
posted by rakish_yet_centered at 5:04 PM on October 31, 2007

I am disappointed that there are hardly any comments here about the democrats' alleged wrongdoing in the 2004 election, which was really the only subject of my fpp. Please note that Nader is not suing Gore! I thought TFA was actually pretty interesting, and this lawsuit is obviously not about sour grapes but about future 3rd party candidates getting a fair shot. But, all you people seem to want to talk about is the past. So, here is some more about the past (gotta give the people what they want, right?).

newdaddy said: any vote cast not for Gore was essentially the moral equivalent of one less vote Bush needed to win

Any vote? What about voters who aren't in "swing states"? I won't say people in Florida shouldn't have voted 3rd party if they didn't like Gore or Bush, but surely you're not saying that even the Nader voters in California are guilty of helping Gore lose, are you? I guess, if there were enough of them, Gore could have lost the "popular vote" in addition to the electoral, but it isn't like the fact that he actually did win it caused Gore not to concede.

psmealey said any political party outside the main two is hopelessly irrelevant.

I wish you would stop saying that, because you're re-enforcing others' belief in that bullshit every time you do. I've studied some U.S. history, and I'm aware we've had two largely similar parties for a good long while now, but some of us are still operating under the view that the future is not predetermined and things can change. And, if you really believed you had no option but to choose one of the two big pro-war candidates in '04 then wtf did you even bother voting for?

A vote for Kerry from an anti-war voter was, essentially, an admission that 2+2=5.

Artw said Man, are people still trotting out "It's okay to throw away your vote on some no-hoper because Democrats and Republicans are exactly the same"? Have these people not watched the news in the last years or something?

Man, maybe you haven't watched the news yourself, so here is a newsflash: the Democrats took the Congress in the '06 election and today the U.S.A. is still torturing people in Iraq and Cuba and who knows where else and the executive branch has so far been neither checked nor balanced, so... what were you saying again?

Also, while not forgetting the Lieberman half of Gore's ticket, and the foreign military action that occurred under the Clinton/Gore administration, lets also remember that despite all of his obvious-even-then stupidity and evilness, Bush actually did run on a platform that included opposition to "nation building" and unnecessary foreign military intervention. So, to some people, Bush could have actually seemed like the candidate less likely to start wars in 2000. (It goes without saying, if I had been old enough to vote then, I would have voted for a 3rd party [and, definitely not Nader]). If anyone feels they must keep talking about the 2000 election in this thread, please address the points in this paragraph.

I think I can see how people might conclude that the Iraq war is the fault of Nader and those who voted for him. Because then, like, such as, it will magically stop being all US Americans' fault, right?
posted by finite at 5:07 PM on October 31, 2007 [2 favorites]

Thank God the Democratic Party is so different from the Republican one. Now that the Democrats control Congress, the occupation of Iraq is just an unpleasant memory, the USA Patriot Act is history, habeas corpus is restored, and the budget deficit is being reduced. Industry lobbyists no longer have undue influence on legislation, and everyone has the health care they need. Happy Days are here again!
posted by Kirth Gerson at 5:08 PM on October 31, 2007 [6 favorites]

So what would be the legal theory here, intentional tort?

I'd like to see the complaint. I suspect it's got the kitchen sink, but I would imagine malicious prosecution, as well as whatever other tort and statutory claims they could come up with.

Wouldn't we be past Statute of Limitations?

That depends on the causes of action. It hasn't been all that long, though, particularly if the alleged actions were only recently discovered.
posted by The World Famous at 5:08 PM on October 31, 2007

Per the lawsuit, I'll have to read more about it, but Nader may have a point--if third parties are actively being shut out of the process, we have no hope of fundamental reforms of any kind in the near future. My personal like or dislike of Nader won't cloud my clarity on that: the two-party system is broken.

Read my comment above, the 12th Amendment. The two party system is written into the Constitution. If you don't get a majority of the Electoral College, the election goes to the House who get to choose from the top three EC vote-getters. Third parties just can't happen under those rules. You want change, amend the 12th.
posted by scalefree at 5:10 PM on October 31, 2007

So the 12th amendment ensures America has a joke-ass democracy? Good to know someone thought enough to write that down.
posted by chunking express at 5:19 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

The weird part about this is that not only are the democratic party leadership showing that they can be as contemptuous of democracy as the republican party leadership but also that the democratic supporters can be as blindly supportive team players as the republicans.

If what Ralph said about both parties being the same wasn't true to begin with he is somehow making it true.
posted by srboisvert at 5:24 PM on October 31, 2007 [4 favorites]

I wish you would stop saying that, because you're re-enforcing others' belief in that bullshit every time you do.

1. I'm not so powerful as you might suspect
2. I only said it once.
3. My stopping saying that won't make it any less true, unfortunately, and
3a. It's not bullshit.

Look, the only way you're ever going to break the two-party stranglehold on power is by conducting a new Constitutional convention and dismantle the Senate, the Electoral College and the entire spoils system. The election system itself perpetuates its own structure (as well as the FEC). You seem to be under the mistaken believe that it's apathy that preserves it. That may be a slight enabler, but that's not what's kept two parties in power for almost all of this countries history. I think a closer reading of history should be required.

while I thought Bush was a lying douche in 2000, I--and, I would venture to guess, many others--had no idea he would turn out to be the absolute nightmare he is.

Seriously? Arbusto Energy, Harken, Sammy Sosa, the governer of the state with the worst environmental record in history, not one single stay of execution on Texas Death Row? Not one?

I don't know what other information you needed about W in 2000, unless you were only getting your news from the major TV networks.
posted by psmealey at 5:27 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

Also, please stop trying to manage the thread.
posted by psmealey at 5:28 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

Ironmouth:Statements like that have got to be backed up. Otherwise they are just noise. "I heard it somewhere" won't count either.

And misplaced callouts like this won't get you far, kid.

Buchanan cost Bush New Mexico, Iowa, Oregon, and Wisconsin, all of which were insanely close. That's 30 votes. Nader just cost Gore Florida and New Hampshire. A combined total of 29. For all you Nader bashers out there, 30 > 29.

If you don't believe me, maybe this will help.
posted by allen.spaulding at 5:33 PM on October 31, 2007

I would be nice if people would discuss Nader's lawsuit against the Democratic Party et al. You know, since that's the only thing the FPP is about.
posted by The World Famous at 5:36 PM on October 31, 2007 [2 favorites]

Seriously? Arbusto Energy, Harken, Sammy Sosa, the governer of the state with the worst environmental record in history, not one single stay of execution on Texas Death Row? Not one?

Yes, seriously. I had no illusions that he was a terrible candidate for the office, and that I would never vote for him, but no: I had no idea he would be off-the-rails crazy, and no idea that the neoconservative foreign policy would be enacted with such vigor.

Also, please stop trying to manage the thread.

Was that intended for me? I've only posted 2 comments in the thread so far....
posted by LooseFilter at 5:40 PM on October 31, 2007

He conceded early! Where is the outrage about that?

There's plenty of outrage to go around. I personally was more pissed about that then about Nader's influence. I mean, shit, you're allowed to run. He didn't do anything wrong, any more than Perot did. The really miserable part of it is that Gore didn't fight for the people that did vote for him.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 5:42 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

psmealey says Look, the only way you're ever going to break the two-party stranglehold on power is by conducting a new Constitutional convention and dismantle the Senate, the Electoral College and the entire spoils system.

Wow. And people say I'm unreasonable. So, do you suggest we just wait for the government to allow us to dismantle it, and keep voting 2+2=5 until that happens?

I'd like to hear what you think about the simple (and reasonable, imho) ideas I mentioned in the comments here for fixing things incrementally without needing to scrap the whole government and start over.

psmealey says Also, please stop trying to manage the thread.

Please stop trying to dictate what next year's reality already is.
posted by finite at 5:50 PM on October 31, 2007

I am disappointed that there are hardly any comments here about the democrats' alleged wrongdoing in the 2004 election, which was really the only subject of my fpp. Please note that Nader is not suing Gore!

Agreed. This thread is fucking bleak. I scrolled through 100 F U NADER!!!1!!11 posts, hoping there was some interesting discussion of the FPP, but alas, nothing. Is this Fark?

The Democrats are, as usual, their own worst enemy. At this point in American politics, when a large part of the left has essentially abandoned Pelosi, it's depressing they still have time to rage about how Nader ruined the world. Any litigation or movement which takes power away from the two-party establishment is, at this time, desperately needed. Both parties have failed us equally - it may be easy to blame it all on one man, but really it's a terrible systemic failure, and there's plenty of blame for everyone. Any tiny foothold for a grassroots movement for electoral reform should be grabbed at the earliest opportunity. If 2000 and 2004 taught us anything, it is that the American democratic system IS BROKEN. Nothing has changed since then.

Many of you apparently need the upcoming 2008 election to finally teach you this lesson, but when Giuliani wins the presidency after Swift Boat Widows for Fuck That Bitch explain to America that Hilary Clinton is, despite what the Democrats would like you to believe, a woman, don't come crying to me.
posted by mek at 6:07 PM on October 31, 2007 [7 favorites]

That all may be true, but it doesn't take away from the fact that: Fuck You, Nader! (101)
posted by found missing at 6:21 PM on October 31, 2007

Hey, here's something from the FPP we can discuss without having to rewind our brains to 2000:

AMY GOODMAN: What impact will all this have on Ralph Nader now? He has said that if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee, he will run for president. It looks like she is the frontrunner right now.

CARL MAYER: Well, in terms of 2008, I can’t speak to 2008. And in politics, things can change quite quickly. I mean, it’s entirely possible that the actual progressive base of the Democratic Party will seek a nominee that reflects their views

Ha ha. They will. And they'll lose.
posted by salvia at 6:21 PM on October 31, 2007

OK, here's some discussion about Ralph Nader that doesn't rely on hypotheticals about the 2000 election (salon link) -- or rather, some stuff that stands out for me:

-Despite his high-falutin' populist rhetoric, he's got an extensive record of being anti-union within his own organization. And not just kinda-sorta anti-union -- flat-out abusive. And he's a jerk to his subordinates in general.

-His 2004 campaign was funded by Republican donors and he was well aware of it.

-Not only has he not expressed any contrition about the results of the 2000 election, he's indicated that he's actually quite all right with how things turned out.

If the Green party wants to file suit against the Democratic Party because they think they've been wronged, I'm not sure I'd mind. They're not my party, but they're generally on my side of the fence. But Ralph Nader didn't run on the Green Party ticket in 2004, and Ralph Nader is a scumbag, so as far as I'm concerned, he can get bent.
posted by spiderwire at 6:47 PM on October 31, 2007

what a difference five years makes
posted by hortense at 6:52 PM on October 31, 2007

mek: This thread is fucking bleak. I scrolled through 100 F U NADER!!!1!!11 posts

I disagree. As I intimated upthread, this isn't a lawsuit (it is well beyond its SOL), its a PR announcement during the democratic primary by someone who is angry at the DNC. That is bullshit, and should be treated as such.

On preview, Spiderwire beat me to it.
posted by rakish_yet_centered at 7:05 PM on October 31, 2007

srboisvert: The weird part about this is that not only are the democratic party leadership showing that they can be as contemptuous of democracy as the republican party leadership but also that the democratic supporters can be as blindly supportive team players as the republicans.

It's not a question of blind support for the Democratic party. It's about taking responsibility for the consequences of your actions (or inaction).

This is especially frustrating for non-Americans. Look, the US government is the most powerful in the world. When it's run by fools and crazy people, this has a huge impact on the rest of the world. If you're an American voter, you have a vital responsibility: Don't elect another government that's as terrible as the Bush administration--or, God forbid, one that's even worse. When the choice is between two evils, choose the lesser evil. Don't vote for a saint who has no chance of winning.

You may only have a single vote, but it matters. What Florida 2000 demonstrated was that even a few hundred votes can make all the difference in the world.

Hans Morgenthau, Scientific Man vs. Power Politics, 1946:

There is no escape from the evil of power, regardless of what one does. Whenever we act with reference to our fellow men, we must sin, and we must still sin when we refuse to act; for the refusal to be involved in the evil of action carries with it the breach of the obligation to do one's duty....

By avoiding a political action because it is unjust, the perfectionist does nothing but exchange blindly one injustice for another which might even be worse than the former. He shrinks from the lesser evil because he does not want to do evil at all. Yet his personal abstention from evil, which is actually a subtle form of egotism with a good conscience, does not at all affect the existence of evil in the world but only destroys the faculty of discriminating between different evils.

posted by russilwvong at 7:15 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

You may only have a single vote, but it matters.

Actually , it doesn't. It made absolutely no difference who I voted for in either of the last two Presidential elections. It will make no difference who I vote for in the next one. I live in Massachusetts. I also don't get to make any difference in the primary, because the nomination is just a formality by the time I get to vote in it.

If I vote for the Democrat, or the Republican, or the Green candidate, or Nader, or Darth Vader in the primary or in the general election, it will have no effect on who the next President is.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 7:27 PM on October 31, 2007

Mr. Nader should be sued for conspiring to use groundless and abusive legislation to harass and intimidate citizens who are likely members of the Democratic Party from exercising their free speech rights to keep his sorry ass off the ballot in as many states as possible, especially since he doesn't have enough support to do what it minimally takes to get on the ballot in any state by any means other than whining.
posted by 3.2.3 at 7:30 PM on October 31, 2007

Kirth Gerson: I live in Massachusetts.

Reagan won Massachusetts in 1980 and 1984.

That aside: What's the deal with Romney? How'd he get elected?
posted by russilwvong at 7:38 PM on October 31, 2007

Okay, all you 2000 Nader blamers, please. Focus all that totally misplaced anger at corrupt voting officials, hanging chads, partisan state attourney generals...and that's just Florida. Not to mention the Supreme Court. James Baker. Jeb Bush. FOX News....shall I go on? Nader is the one honest player in that whole mess and people still think he didn't have the right to run. Geez.

Let's go back in a time machine to 2000, to what Nader was (essentially) saying back then...

"what this lawsuit campaign will do, and the importance of it is, is to set a precedent so that the two-party monopoly system that shuts out minor parties in a way that other Western democracies never do, that this will set a precedent to prevent this type of intimidation and harassment."

Folks, Nader doesn't really want to be president and never did. He wants to break up the two-party system. That's his goal. With a multiparty system, the theory goes, voters will have more power at all level of government, and it'll be a much better system for checks and balances. Most industrialized nations (namely Europe) have a multiparty system, and they have their imperfections, too, so IMHO it's not exactly a magic elixir, but it could motivate folks to be more involved.

Everyone bitches about how the American political system sucks, and here's a guy actually trying to do something about it. Save your stones for the real bad guys.
posted by zardoz at 7:41 PM on October 31, 2007

I disagree. As I intimated upthread, this isn't a lawsuit (it is well beyond its SOL), its a PR announcement during the democratic primary by someone who is angry at the DNC. That is bullshit, and should be treated as such.

This is false and irrelevant. The S.O.L in D.C. is 3 years (not sure but it's at least 3), which means it's just expiring for these allegations and some of them certainly fall within it. That's also irrelevant for any number of legal reasons, not least of which the case involves the defendant's bankruptcy, which obviously limits his ability to construct a case, which is grounds to extend a SOL.
posted by mek at 7:45 PM on October 31, 2007

zardoz: He wants to break up the two-party system. That's his goal.

In politics, one's actions and especially their consequences are more important than their motives. What were the actual consequences of Nader's 2000 campaign?
posted by russilwvong at 7:46 PM on October 31, 2007

What were the actual consequences of Nader's 2000 campaign?

We're still talking about it all these years later, for one.
posted by finite at 7:50 PM on October 31, 2007

Ralph Nader shouldn't be suing anyone. He should be shaving his head and kneeling in the street praying to god for his eternal soul.
posted by found missing at 7:52 PM on October 31, 2007

Fuck you all. Vote Kucinich, or die. That is all.
posted by HyperBlue at 8:01 PM on October 31, 2007

Everyone bitches about how the American political system sucks, and here's a guy actually trying to do something about it.

He's trying the wrong things is the problem. He should stop running as a spoiler vanity candidate & start a campaign to amend the 12th to remove or alter the "majority" bit. There's not even theoretically a way his or anybody else's third party could become viable because our Constitution just isn't written that way. The election would just go to the House & even if he came in first in both the EC & popular votes they'd just pick whichever party's in the majority's candidate.

As long as you need a majority to win the Presidency that means two parties, period.
posted by scalefree at 8:05 PM on October 31, 2007

Nader is the one honest player in that whole mess and people still think he didn't have the right to run.

"The central element of Ralph Nader's public appeal is, and has always been, honesty":

When American University professor Jamin Raskin proposed that Nader supporters in swing states swap their votes with Gore supporters in safe states ...Nader denounced the idea. ...

Then there was the debate within the Nader campaign over where to travel in the waning days of the campaign. Some Nader advisers urged him to spend his time in uncontested states such as New York and California. These states -- where liberals and leftists could entertain the thought of voting Nader without fear of aiding Bush -- offered the richest harvest of potential votes. But, Martin writes, Nader ... insisted on spending the final days of the campaign on a whirlwind tour of battleground states such as Pennsylvania and Florida. In other words, he chose to go where the votes were scarcest, jeopardizing his own chances of winning 5 percent of the vote, which he needed to gain federal funds in 2004. Nader does not mention this decision in his own account of the campaign. He does write that when Sellers worried that he would focus on electoral battlegrounds, "I told him we were running a fifty-state campaign to maximize our votes and were not going out of our way to target swing states." Either Nader was lying to Sellers or is lying to his readers.
posted by spiderwire at 8:06 PM on October 31, 2007

If you voted for Nader you might as well have written your vote on a napkin and flushed it down the toilet.

You can say precisely the same thing about Gore and Kerry as well, because they didn't win either. The only difference is, you'd need a bigger napkin. And bizzarely, the constituency that Nader represents -- those on the left who feel disenfranchised by the Democrats -- will now feel even more disenfranchised, because it's not like the Dems said 'we need to win those people over and make sure next time around they do vote for us'. Instead, they keep on shouting 'more of the same, you'll like it or lump it!'

Well fuck you. I don't like it and I won't lump it. You can keep your rotten stinking party machine. I'm glad I live in a civilized country where we accept that people have a right to vote for third parties and we don't lay the blame with them for the failure of the sad sack losers that couldn't carry enough of the vote to win. If *you* don't like it, then ensure that your party has policies and personalities that can carry enough support to win it.

And if all that those of you did about ensuring that the Dems won in those elections was to vote for them, well fuck you too. Because you're *just* as responsible for the loss as those party members are. You want a different outcome? Then involve yourself in the party and make it electable. Don't whine because somebody has a different vision of how politics might be -- make your own vision one that more people can sign up for. That's how the system works. If you don't like it, work to change it, but complaining because someone else is doing precisely that might be the most ridiculous thing I've heard in my life.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 8:38 PM on October 31, 2007 [8 favorites]

Ralph Nader: Consumer protection advocate. Corporate pornography opponent. Pro-Bush. Anti-Gore. Pro-life. Anti-abortion.

Progressive!
posted by spiderwire at 8:43 PM on October 31, 2007

You know, I like Ralph Nader. And I love Democracy Now. But I think a single link post to a DN segment isn't really super great. I mean, it could have helped to beef it up with some context. Have candidates sued before in similar historic incidents? Is there some public response from the Democrats? Something besides Democracy Now?
posted by serazin at 8:51 PM on October 31, 2007

I like pugs but I could vote for a French bulldog.
posted by y2karl at 8:54 PM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

According to the Florida Department of State election results for president in the 2000 election, Bush beat Gore by 537 votes, 2,912,790 votes to 2,912,253. Nader got 97,488 votes in Florida. If 99% of Florida Nader voters in 2000 didn't vote for Gore, and 1% voted did, Gore would've won by 974 votes, which is almost twice Bush's official margin.

Well before the 2000 election Gore had written a book on the environment, founded the GLOBE Program on Earth Day 1994, and strongly sponsored the Kyoto Treaty (symbolically signing it in 1998). Bush was the governor of a state that led the nation "in air pollution, in toxic chemicals released, in factories violating clean water standards" and "according to the Environmental Protection Agency, of having the dirtiest air in America, of ranking 47th in water quality, and having the seventh-highest rate of release of toxic industrial byproducts onto its land." You'd think supporters of the motherfucking Green Party might have seen a teensy-weensy difference instead of saying there wasn't any difference, as Nader himself did.

The Supreme Court's intervention was bullshit because of the conservative justices' flip-flop on states' rights and the ludicrous this-isn't'-a-precedent clause, but it did not cost Gore the election. In November 2001 a media consortium counted the votes, and Gore would not have won under any of the scenarios that actually happened. If the Supreme Court hadn't stopped the recount, Bush would have won by 493 votes. Gore would have won under some scenarios, but not in the actual recount. He would have won if he had asked for a statewide recount, but he didn't do that; he only asked for recounts in four counties (Broward, Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, and Volusia) that he thought he would win.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:19 PM on October 31, 2007 [3 favorites]

I heard Nader day something like "Vote your hopes, not your fears".

Man, is that backwards.
posted by spaltavian at 11:11 PM on October 31, 2007

Wow. And people say I'm unreasonable. So, do you suggest we just wait for the government to allow us to dismantle it, and keep voting 2+2=5 until that happens?

Straw man (bonus points for the 1984 reference, though). I suggest we continue to support people like Howard Dean, who are working within the current (and unfortunate) structures to effect some real change, and not pay much mind to people like Ralph Nader who's basically having a temper tantrum and asking for my vote on that basis.

As long as you need a majority to win the Presidency that means two parties, period.

Exactly. Until the 12th amendment is amended itself (no more majority of electoral college, or some tweaks like instant run-off voting, you're pretty much going to get what we have.

None of us like it, but barring economic or governmental collapse (like the one that comported FDR to victory), it won't change. The power is too entrenched, and the overwhelming majority of people are too risk averse (John Anderson 5%, Ross Perot 9%) to vote for reform.
posted by psmealey at 2:59 AM on November 1, 2007

This is especially frustrating for non-Americans. Look, the US government is the most powerful in the world. When it's run by fools and crazy people, this has a huge impact on the rest of the world. If you're an American voter, you have a vital responsibility: Don't elect another government that's as terrible as the Bush administration--or, God forbid, one that's even worse. When the choice is between two evils, choose the lesser evil. Don't vote for a saint who has no chance of winning.

That is a fine strategy as long as you always want your choice to be between two evils. I hear people here ranting as though GWB is the anti-christ and if only he were not elected America would revert back to being a peace loving paradise example of freedom. I understand where this can come from if you are young but if you are older than 30 you know it is bullshit. Bush and his admin are more nakedly corrupt than any other but in terms of actions they are not that different from other post-WWII admins. This isn't the first trumped up excuse for war. This is the first bungled war. This isn't the first time an admin has sanctioned and covered up atrocities.

So far the Democratic saviors in congress have shown a pretty impressive unwillingness to check this conduct. The leading Democratic candidates also show an unwillingness to withdraw from Iraq. Why is that?

Because they know you will chose the lesser of two evils and as long as they say please and thank you they are less evil than BushCo.
posted by srboisvert at 3:04 AM on November 1, 2007 [3 favorites]

I see where you're coming from srboisvert, but I don't think the choice is always between the lesser of two evils.

This is bound to be an unpopular position, but for his philandering and the ensuing scandal the mired his administration in powerlessness for 2+ years, Bill Clinton was a perfectly reasonable president. It's a big ship to steer, and you are invariably going to piss people off on both sides when you do it, but I don't see any examples of war mongering (if anything, they were too slow to intervene in Bosnia, and were guilty in ignoring Rwanda, etc.) and other atrocious behavior.

Neither did I think that Gore was an "evil" in 2000. Kerry was also perfectly respectable man to run, even if a terrible candidate.

For 2008, though, you are spot on. If the primaries play out to current form, we will have a lying, fear-mongering, police state enthusiast running against an untested, pandering triangulator, who, despite it all, still thinks invading Iraq was a good idea.

Fuck, despite what I said above, I may end up writing Nader in.
posted by psmealey at 3:17 AM on November 1, 2007